


teach me how (to love my demon)

by ofhobbitsandwomen (litvirg)



Series: braime prompts [1]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon Universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-09 11:34:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18637321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/litvirg/pseuds/ofhobbitsandwomen
Summary: Tyrion’s voice faded behind him.You knew exactly what she was,he’d said to him.And you loved her anyway.Was this what it was to be on the other side of the equation?prompt fill: braime + 'tyrion or someone says "wow you guys have been married in like three different ceremonies just today"'





	teach me how (to love my demon)

It was a stitch.

Slowly, pulling the tattered pieces of himself back together. Worn thread pulled from other fabrics, loop by loop making him into something resembling the shape of a man.

The first stitch had lost him a hand. The second had come with the angry swipe of a bear. Each new stitch would come with a strong hand–not his own, never his own–forcing the hems of his honor back together just before he gave in and let them unravel again.

And now here she stood, hands strong as always, fixing the last pieces of himself back where they always should have been–where they could have been if not for his own selfish weakness.

“You would fight beside him?”

The room stilled around him as they waited for her answer with bated breath. He glanced around, watched all the eyes in the room shift from him, the Kingslayer to the woman, the warrior beside him.

Except Tyrion, who’s eyes stayed locked on him. Always loyal in all the wrong ways. Jaime let his eyes flick over to his brother. No good ever came from Lannisters in the North, but he was starting to think their luck was turning.

“I would.”

The needle she used to close the gaps hung loose at her hips as she left his side, left the room, with barely a nod, as though she hadn’t just done it all again.

•••

Tyrion’s voice faded behind him. _You knew exactly what she was,_ he’d said to him. _And you loved her anyway._

Was this what it was to be on the other side of the equation?

•••

“What are you doing?” she spun toward him.

“What?”

“I think you know.”

But he wasn’t his brother. He wasn’t his sister. He wasn’t clever, he couldn’t read them all as easily. He could barely read himself. So when he opened his mouth, it was the truth that fell out without a thought.

“I truly don’t.”

It wasn’t disappointment he saw in her eyes. It was exasperation. Apprehension, buried beneath the sapphire pools.

“We have never had a conversation last this long without you insulting me. Not once.”

It wasn’t true, not quite.

But her eyes raked over him and he didn’t know how to tell the true answer. The reason that the ride from King’s Landing to Winterfell felt like a homecoming. Like he was leaving the old, useless, battered pieces of himself gone for good. With each mile he became whole again, fuller, truer, than he’d ever been.

_I’m here for you. I’m trying to make use of the pieces you scraped together_.

Instead, he said, “Do you want me to insult you?”

“No!”

“Good.”

His fingers, unsteady as always, flitted against his left leg. The urge to mock, to jape, had faded, a patch of himself bleached away by the sun, eroded by the salt in the sea’s water, melted and evaporated with the first flake of winter on his golden palm.

It had gone long ago, when the lion threaded through his heart began to fray, golden strings covered stitch by stitch by a deep, rich blue.

When he turned back toward the castle, Tyrion stood still atop the battlements, his gaze shot down in his brother’s direction. But his eyes followed her steps away from Jaime, slow and steady, until Tyrion turned himself away.

•••

“You don’t need a king.”

He couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought of it until the wildling purred into her ear, leaning himself closer and closer to Brienne.

“I’ll prove it.”

Maybe _this_ was why.

Maybe they’d all die before the dawn, maybe he’d come to the right side on the right cause too late.

But he could do this. He could pile the sloppy pieces of himself that he’d cobbled together–that _she’d_ cobbled together–to do this one thing to pay her back. He could take the role he didn’t fit in anymore, use it as a block for her to rise up on and see the world as she should.

“Arise, Brienne of Tarth.” his voice caught, wavering slightly. But only slightly. He pushed on and hoped she didn’t notice. “Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.”

•••

“I should have known it was a woman,” Tyrion said when all the rest had left.

“What’s that?”

“That led you here.” They were out of ale, out of wine, and Tyrion’s smile had the honest & loose quality it always got at the bottom of the cup.

“It wasn’t Cersei’s lies that drove you away,” he carried on. “I thought, maybe it had been. But you’ve seen past her lies for quite some time haven’t you?”

“I don’t know what your talking about.”

The chairs around them seemed too big, too empty, now it was just the two of them again.

“She saw you for what you really were,” Tyrion said. “So you had no choice but to start seeing everything around you as it really was.”

Jaime felt the breath leave his body, like a long, slow leak. One last tightening of the rope winding around his ribcage, holding him all together.

“I should be insulted you know,” Tyrion said. “I’ve seen you as you are our whole lives. Not quite the same though, is it?”

His fingers danced against the hilt of his sword.

“ _Ser Brienne of Tarth,_ ” Tyrion said once more. “ _Knight of the Seven Kingdoms._ ”

**Author's Note:**

> send prompts and stuff to me over at @ofhobbitsandwomen on tumblr dot com


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